I’ll be the fly in the ointment. They have sneaky big problems, even with those guys.
Just filling in the roster next year is going to be a challenge. Between those contracts and the bonus overages for Bergeron and Krejci, they have ~$6 million to sign something like 6-7 forwards, plus resign Frederic and Swayman (or take what they’re given in arbitration). So at minimum, the pipe dream people had of resigning Bertuzzi needs to die, it almost literally can’t happen. So money has to come out somewhere. Maybe now that they’re down to the last year of it, you can get a taker for Mike Reilly, but he also spent the entire year in Providence. Forbort also has one left, but somehow this team thinks they’re better with him on the ice. Trade Carlo, and you trade a young stay-at-home defenceman that somehow was one of the team’s better skaters in this series. Grzelcyk is also on his last year, so maybe, but that’s still just $3.7m for next season. You’ll need every forward they still have signed, full stop. Ullmark’s NMC does turn into a 16-team NTC this summer, but is Swayman ready for 55+ games? Is Bussi ready to be an NHL backup with 35 games on his plate?
There’s a reason the organization looked at this season as the last shot to push all-in. With Pastrnak getting his big payday, they were going to lose that roster flexibility that made them monsters.
